Use your waffle maker for something other than, well, waffles. Brave bakers can try pressing grilled cheese, cinnamon rolls, hash browns and - yes- even pizza. If you’re a dessert lover, a waffle cone maker will bring the ice cream parlor to you. You can even create a Belgian waffle bowl with a specially designed waffle maker, and then fill it with anything you like. Yes, I can make Belgium waffles now! I still need to work on a from scratch recipe, but this turns out great waffles with either Stonewall Kitchen Farmhouse Pancake and Waffle Mix or Carbon's Golden Malted Pancake and Waffle Flour Mix -- I like both over other mixes. I can get the crispy outside and soft inside just like at a restaurant. My family was impressed but I drove them crazy as all I fixed for a couple of weeks I had the waffle-maker was different kinds of waffles with different toppings and fruits and foods. I like the thin profile vertical storage as well. And it is true that you really cannot overcook your waffles. Setting the waffle maker timer at 4 minutes seems perfect. And do not overfill - makes a sticky mess. 1/2 cup of batter seems to work fine. Lightly oil before the first use; then no need after that. Electric waffle irons are available in flip and stationary models. Proponents of flip waffle makers suggest that they heat more evenly by better distributing the batter throughout the plates. After testing both styles with different batters to see if this was truly a useful feature, we found that our three high-end picks cooked all the batters on the top and the bottom evenly. There was no difference between our flip model and a high-end stationary model. We did, however, find the flip a useful function when comparing lower-end models cooking the thinner buttermilk batter. Ultimately, we didn't pick any low-end flip models because, although they may have heated more evenly than our budget picks, they cooked the batter so slowly that the waffles ended up too dense and heavy.
That said, quite a few users say that this waffle maker isn't as sturdily built as previous versions of the same model, and that if you don't get the top heating plate aligned just right, it can fall off -- an injury hazard if the plate is hot. The top of the G48TD also gets very hot. Some use pliers to bend the metal clips that hold the heating plates in place, which helps them line up better -- or you can just use an oven mitt to protect your hands.

I love making waffles, they are my favorite breakfast item. My old waffle iron (an Oster) recently broke, so had to get a new one. There are multiple features of this one that are excellent. The electronics are all on the base, so the top doesn't have to have any cords going through the hinge. The lights are helpful and settings cover a good range of lightly/little browning to dark/lots of browning. The cord wrap and lock is a nice feature as well, since it takes up less space when stored upright.

Unfortunately, we were disappointed by the performance of the Waring Pro. Despite being the most expensive waffle maker among our finalists, it produced waffles slower than every other waffle maker. In our benchmark two waffle cooking test, the Waring Pro took 16 minutes and 30 seconds — nearly nine minutes longer than the BELLA waffle maker, and almost two minutes slower than the second slowest waffle maker, the Hamilton Beach.

Cooks can use a convenient appliance like a double waffle maker or a countertop oven to save time and space. The baking plates of a double waffle iron are coated to prevent sticking so the Belgian waffles don’t get caught when removing the pastries from the unit. The flip design of a double waffle iron makes it easy to perfectly brown and then remove each waffle. If the waffle maker accidentally gets left on, its automatic shutoff feature turns it off. This preserves the life of the device and avoids the risk of an overheated electric appliance causing a fire.

Because waffle irons are more of a kitchen extravagance than an absolute necessity, we decided to test out a few non-waffle items in the machines just for kicks—the more versatile these tools can be, the better. We waffled up some grilled cheese and sage stuffing to see how the machines would do. As we’ve seen in the past, a waffle iron may be the best tool to make things like grilled cheese: The divots become extra crisp, with cheese oozing out and forming a crackling frico, while the peaks remain soft and chewy. The nonstick surface ensures no bits of stuffing or bread are left behind. The results of this test followed the trend of the previous ones, with our high-end picks edging out the rest.

The Cuisinart Round Classic Waffle Maker also has a non-stick coating (although you'll want to apply a little cooking oil beforehand for best results), and it's small enough to take up very little space, especially when stored on its edge. Watch your fingers, though: testers for Wirecutter and Your Best Digs warn that steam sometimes vents onto the handle when you open the lid, making it hot to the touch. Users who encounter this issue solve it by putting something heavy on top of the waffle maker's lid to keep it shut as the waffle cooks, which in turn stops the steam from escaping; or you could just wear an oven mitt when you open it.

This waffle maker has made it to our number 1 spot for consistently delivering delicious waffles that have that crispy exterior and fluffy interior. The Krups Waffle Maker allows you to cook 4 slices at the same time. It comes with audible alerts so you don’t always have to keep watching the waffle maker. There are 5 adjustable browning levels to give you more control in th2 cooking. And it can store vertically or horizontally.
Flip or stationary? Once you’ve chosen between Belgian or American-style waffles, the next step is to determine if you want the assistance of a flip mechanism. Without flipping over the irons, you’re relying on the rising agent in your batter (or just over-filling your waffle maker) to quickly and evenly fill the top plate. The flip mechanism ensures even distribution for more consistent waffles. They take up more space vertically, but in the storage position they’re actually pretty manageable.

The Krups GQ502D took a little more time than some of the other models we tested to bake waffles. In our tests, waffles typically took about seven or eight minutes to cook, while the Presto FlipSide, for one, cooked a thicker waffle in about half the time. But the machines that cooked faster also tended to overcook, or to develop hot spots. A few extra minutes of waiting time is a small price to pay for golden, even-toned waffles, and the wait isn’t so bad when you can make four waffles at once.

A. It's great to get kids involved in the kitchen, and making waffles is a relatively simple task. Waffle makers are fairly safe, but because the cooking plates get very hot, we don’t recommend kids use them without an age-appropriate level of adult supervision. Ideally, look for waffle makers with handles or exteriors that stay cool to the touch while in use.